Well you cant deny they have sucked in a lot of people. :P

It's laughable that anyone still believes that WU were all set to have a stadium up and running by 2020 (as they publicly stated back in 2018.
A few on here were saying, and I quote:  it's shovel ready!!
It was nothing but a con job, surely everyone understands that now - a massive con job to get access to cheap land - it's nothing but a great big property play, and they managed to find a naive local council to give them a bit of a kick start.
So, the first promise in the bid - build and own their own stadium...not kept.
2nd promise in the bid - play out of Geelong to build support acorss the Geelong district and outer Western suburbs of Meloburne...not kept.
What happened next?
Actually tried to use Lakeside as a home base!!  That's how far this farce has gone - shamelessly wanted to use the home ground of the club that should have won the bid in the first place.
And now they're the 3rd club playing out of AAMII.
To think that many on here thought Lakeside was too close a base to warrant an A-League club.
What a farce.

What is absolutely diabolical is the lack of transparency from this club.

There must be some serious issues going on behind closed doors. 

To not be publicising the progress being made on their venue, whether it is the construction of the training ground or the "stadium" is just not right. All other clubs would be providing at a minimum fortnightly updates.

They are hiding what is actually going on, there no two ways about it. 

They need to publically address the stadium situation. it will end up being 10 years behind schedule. 

All they need to do is get the exact same temporary stand that the Perth Glory have got behind the goals on the right-hand side of their stadium (TV angle) and pair that with the stand being built at the training ground and they are away. 

Just be honest. The rest of the sporting industry in the country are laughing at them and the APL about how they are even in this league.

Of course there are issues - it was a con job!
There are still anonymous foreign backers we know nothing about - and the odds are high that these will be Chinese property developers.

Thankfully, only a couple of hundred (if you dont count the players, families, friends and various other sycophants).

The damage wont be too bad when they finally give up on the "dream"

Extraordinary that this kind of technology is being deployed in other countries and not even discussed here:

https://www.thestadiumbusiness.com/2023/02/10/vancouver-fc-reveals-first-image-of-flat-pack-stadium/

WUFC should have been doing this from the start at any of the grounds in the west that could accomodate this. This could seriously have been done at City Vista from the word go. 

Yes. 
If they actually wanted to build something themselves. 
Privately built and owned didn't they say??

But only council is building a training venue. 
And no other commercial building group investors could be convinced to come in on the project and build anything for them. 

Hmmm thats a shame... This franchise seemed like such a visionary football focused organisation... You would think, with their army of volunteers and staff, after nearly 5 years, they could have at least dug out the foundations for the shovel ready venture? One shovel-ful from each of their members?

Someone supplied a toilet seat

I think the saddest thing is that I do think this could have worked if it was executed properly, but the Western Victoria/ Melbourne and Tasmanian Nomads has just lost its way. 

Hey there is Sayers Rd leading in and out, they just need some cattle on both sides fenced off with a couple of poultry farms nearby.
Fans will see this as a rural or cultural experience. Townsend can do some marketing with that. 

Hardly any team is doing well with crowd numbers. Not helped by Covid and its ongoing impacts, as well as an impotent APL.

If current clubs are doing shit, imagine what it would do for a starter club struggling to establish.

Could always promote an established one

Sure they can blame COVID and APL. Slightly

But western United's issues have been around long before both came into existence. 
WU is probably the least affected by it, in terms of a sheer drop in numbers. 
Their base was poor to begin with. 
Their nomadic existence and playing all games away from their heartland bar 1 (western oval) hasn't helped. 
This is not due to COVID or APL
Solely due to decisions the club has made. 

WU base wasn't poor to begin with, it was non existent.

The WU fan base was POOR when COVID struck and APL was introduced. 

So blaming their dwindling crowd figures on that is wrong. 

There were also bids from other cities you know. If they had just gone with Canberra and Wollongong, which both have existing rectangular stadiums that are a pretty decent fit for A-League, and an actual fan base interested in attending games, the league would be in far better shape than it is now. They could have even given WU a provisional licence that could be activated whenever the mythical stadium actually got built.

But no, instead we got Gallop's moronic "fish where the fish are" mantra and Foxtel's bizarre insistence on the expansion sides being in Sydney and Melbourne, as if a team in those cities with 3k fans is worth more than a team outside them with 10k fans. And then Gallop was gone soon afterwards, Foxtel bailed anyway (after trying to wriggle out of the expansion clause when WU were playing in Geelong), and we're stuck with two teams that are millstones around the neck of the A-League, while potential clubs in other cities languish in a perpetual limbo state.

Foxtel (reportedly) did NOT want WMG, neither did Delloits who classified their bid (to paraphrase) as the "biggest load of shit in history".... 

i call bullshit on that. No one can convince me Wollongong would have been commercially viable in the AL. I'm not convinced there is a sufficient supporter base in Wollongong. Yeah they have a stadium, but I have heard WIN Stadium is a shithole in need of an upgrade. There is also the issue of 5 of the 12 current teams being based in NSW.

But anyway, we will see if Wollongong actually makes a bid for the NSD, let alone run a financially sustainable team in the long term.

"Reportedly" by whom? And really Delloits said that, or was it SM Hellas? Your improvisations are magic.......lol.

I agree that there were that many differing opinions across the country that it wasn't funny. Certainly bitterness by the odd one that missed out.

At the end of the day, the best considered entity was proposed by the FFA and endorsed by the new FA.

Maybe and perhaps WU wasn't the best after all, but isn't hindsight wonderful.

It's been said many a time already. 
WU were only accepted because they paid the most money
The other clincher was they were able to survive without the TV distribution money from Foxtel that was already committed to the other 10 clubs. 

MacArthur next best but paid less. That's why they came in a year later. 

Had nothing to do with "best entity or proposal". 

Basically pay the most and show that you can sustain losses in the short term. 

Wollongong has about the same population as the Central Coast and a much more developed football ecosystem. The Illawarra league has been playing for more than 100 years, and the Wolves have been in existence for more than 40 years.

If the Mariners have survived for 20 years then why wouldn't a Wollongong side? Would they be attendance juggernauts? No, they would likely be at the level of the Mariners or Wellington. But they would have a local population who would care about them, which is a damn sight more than can be said about either of the current expansion sides. And they would likely run at much less of a loss than either of those too.

WIN Stadium is a tidy little ground, appropriately sized for A-League, and has an excellent atmosphere with 7-8k in attendance. The Western grandstand was rebuilt a few years ago and is perfectly serviceable. There is a grass hill on the eastern side which could be redeveloped but other than that it is fine. And remember, we're comparing them to WU, who don't have any stadium at all.

Since the Wolves already have an NPL presence (where they are consistently one of the top teams), Wollongong is probably the closest of any regional area to having a ready-made A-League team that could step into the league at the drop of a hat if called upon.

But but but like Mariners, aside from they're current major shareholder Peil, the Wolves can never attract solid sponsorship. Money is always an issue. Sentiment does not count for much. Salary cap will always be overly relied upon to keep stronger clubs down. Gallop's dream will keep multiplying.

Can you call it hindsight when even blind Freddy was calling for a different outcome BEFORE Nikou and O'Rourke's massive blunder??? 
My "improvisations" as you call them may be speculation and rumour I admit however your statements are just based on your blinding hatred of anything to do with your past life.... I would say of the two of us you are the more "bitter"

People re-writing history - it was 100% obvious to most of us back in 2018 that the WU bid was a massive con job, a massive real estate play backed by anonymous foreign property developers.
It was completely obvious at the time of the WU bid that they would NOT have a 15,000 privately owned stadium built within 2 and a half years like they were claiming.
There was zero doubt at the time about that.  It was a fairy tale of the highest order, and you would have to have been the dumbest muthaf**r on earth if you truly believed it.
It was obvious at the time that the "temporary" solution to having a home ground at Kardinia Park in Geelong would be a failure.

Now consider:
 - we had an excellent bid from an established, historic club (an actual club),  with an existing supporter base
 - this club, a real club, had a long term lease on a fantastic venue only a few kms outside of the Melbourne CBD

Now what were some of the arguments made against South Melbourne at the time (at least the ones made that were trying to avoid direct racial vilification):
 - that Lakeside was oval in shape (you mean like Kardinia Park??)
 - that Lakeside was too close to AAMI (yes, incredibly, many were claiming that!  as if that was somehow a disadvantage)

Lo and behold, what ends iup happening?  Firstly, WU tries to get use of Lakeside, and secretly by-pass South Melbourne's lease (not only are they fraudsters, they are dumb and don't understand contract law), and when that failed - they are actually playing out of AAMI!!

I mean seriously, it is impossible to overstate what  an absurd selection WU was, and it has nothing to do with hindsight - it was obvious at the time of the selection.  IN the end, it was down to lobbying from the other Melbourne clubs, with a dose of petty vindictiveness (and who knows who was being paid off behind the scenes).

The Westfield model is the con-job

The thought that selling a license to WU is any different to selling the GF to NSW tourism is the problem

You either pay money for the APL/Lowy product or go elsewhere

CCM have barely survived for 20 years. When they had all those years at the bottom, they were trying to play games in North Sydney. There was even talk of relocation there. And SM once tried to buy their licence.

I‘m far from convinced about their long term viability… especially if/when they get relegated in future years. I hope they survive of course. Australia needs 30 professional clubs. I hope all clubs survive. But history says that won't happen.

In fact, you're being naïve you don’t think some clubs in the NSD won’t go broke and fold. It happened in the AL and it will happen in the NSD.

But going back to Wollongong, read my post again. Its one thing to get bums on seats, its another thing being financially viable. @Footytball ^^^ made a valid point. Who’s gonna back them? 

In the end financial viability comes down to how many supporters you can get to identify with the team. Other than that you have to rely on sugardaddies who can disappear overnight and leave the team bankrupt and quickly defunct. Outside of a tiny nucleus of support, WU and Macarthur have been met with a wall of apathy, despite at times good on-field results. Even winning silverware hasn't moved the dial for them. Why would they, when there are more established teams in the same cities?

The Mariners, on the other hand, have a solid core support of ca. 6-8k fans who turn up through thick and thin, and beyond this have a broader resonance in the community, since they are the only club on a national sporting stage. People actually care about the team and its fortunes. Wellington is the same. Wollongong would be similar (an NRL club only plays part-time in the region). It might be harder to drum up sponsorship in smaller regions but the teams can still endure on threadbare resources, as Central Coast have shown.

In any case I think we'll get to the point where there will be a big 4 (MV, MC, SFC and WSW), and then challengers from BR, PG, AU and maybe a future Auckland side. Any clubs beyond this will per force be on the scale of the Mariners or lower, whether they are regional or metropolitan. If we want a professional football set-up beyond the five core metro areas, then we have to figure out how to make it work in places like Gold Coast, Canberra, Wollongong, Geelong, Hobart, Sunshine Coast, and below that Townsville, Cairns, Ballarat, Bendigo, Albury-Wodonga, North Coast NSW, etc. A pyramid that would allow such clubs to find their natural level is ideal, but in some places you would also need to create new all-inclusive entities that the whole region could get behind.

Cool assumptions!

I see absolutely no blinding hatred what I said there whatsover. The statement I made (which you refer to) is much closer in accuracy than the "speculation and rumour" you constantly purport to be fact. But I suppose you will next tell me you had a crystal ball.......lol.